


A Conversation

by queenofinks



Category: Fallen London | Echo Bazaar
Genre: Other, POV Second Person, Second City, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:00:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23598763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofinks/pseuds/queenofinks
Summary: In the end, we are the choices we make.
Relationships: Mr Candles/Mr Veils
Comments: 5
Kudos: 10





	A Conversation

You find it in a garden, under the shade of a tamarisk tree. It notices you and points to a single bud floating on the bank of the once-Nile with tightly furled petals that are a luminous white.

“Look.” Its voice is hushed with excitement. “It’s flowering.”

So it is. The bud (a lotus, which is a name you pull from the memory of a recent visit to Spices’ atelier) unravels slowly, pointing its face toward the roof of the Neath like a drowned man. The sight intrigues you for only a second. You could find larger, more impressive blooms out in the most untamed corners of the Wilderness, with perfumes that could smother armies. Only humans would satisfy themselves with something this small and short-lived. But your friend looks at the lotus with such fondness in its eyes that you relent, a little.

You settle beside Candles, rearranging your silks so the waters cannot stain them. Candles breaks its vigil to flash a sharp grin at you; one you return in earnest.

Many Curators hate the sight of your smile, courtesy of your teeth. But not Candles. Nevertheless, it drops its smile as its gaze wanders back out toward the pond.

“These flowers will not last long,” it says sadly. “Not here, in the darkness. Not even with my help.”

You say nothing, awkward as ever about your friend’s melancholy. Your closeness to Candles confuses your associates (least of all you). It is sensitive and soft-hearted, while you are as vicious as the day you left the starred void unwillingly for the Neath. But it has never once looked down on you, despite your many differences. You think it may even respect you. Still, you have no comfort to offer.

“What do you think the city will look like in ten, twenty years?” Candles asks suddenly. “They change so quickly,” and you can hear the wryness in its voice, “that it will be as if another city sprang up in its place. By then, the buildings and roads will all be different. New trends will replace old ones.” Candles glances up at you with a mischievous look in its eyes. “Your beloved silks may even be dowdy in the years to come.”

You bristle with outrage, teeth glinting in a horrific, motile display that fails to evoke even a shudder in your companion. “And candles may be snuffed!”

You feel a brief pang of shame when Candles’ expression becomes unexpectedly sober.

“I wonder,” it says, looking down at the wet dirt, “if the light will be enough. It would not be the first... _deficiency_ of mine.”

Your mouth twists.

“I know they pine for the real light of their sun,” Candles continues, wringing its hands fretfully. “But I’m trying. It is laborious work to provide humans with the things they need for their stories.”

“Indeed,” you agree coolly. “They make such a fuss over fabrics, yet find my most splendid patterns to be disagreeable.”

Candles laughs; piping, sweet, self-conscious. “Can you blame them? Their fashions change so often.”

“Oh yes,” you reply, with a sneer. “These humans _love_ change. They swap alliances every week. Their affections are fickle, their egos easily bruised. It makes prying stories from them so d__nably hard. I would like some _consistency_.”

“I like that humans change,” Candles says, with something like wistfulness in its voice. “It is a mark of – of freedom, perhaps. Children learn and grow older so they can choose who to be. Servants rise above their station or plot the fall of kings. A human who has lived in the shadow of her twin may change her appearance so that she may be herself one day.”

You pick at your sleeves. “Changing one’s appearance does not change one’s nature.”

“Yes.” Candles looks out to the waters, to the single lotus bloom. “But wanting to change does.”

Both of you are quiet for a minute. Then Candles speaks, in its low and plaintive tenor. “We are born knowing what we are and die knowing nothing else,” and you can hear it, the rage in its voice, “without a choice, without the freedom to ask _why_.”

Dark spots splash the front of its robes. You realise, with horror, that they are its tears.

“But I see humans every day being _more_ than what they are. I see lovers shed all the importance of rank so they can live nameless as equals. I see humans reject the forms they were born with so they can live in bodies that speak true to their hearts. But I also see humans crushed by the mud of their beginnings and denied the chance to grow or learn or be _anything_ else; because they are too poor, too weak, too small. And who decides that for them? Who takes away their freedom to change? To choose?”

Perhaps too late, you understand why Candles is so distraught.

“Humans do not have runts as we do,” you say, gently. As gently as you can. Candles makes an exasperated face under its cowl. “Our origins mean nothing. Whatever we were before, we are Masters now.”

“Because we have no choice!” Its mouth smoulders with the letters of the Correspondence. It is getting close to real anger now – to despair _._ “But they do.” A shuddering sigh. “I was – I am still – I will _always_ be a runt. I could never be anything but a runt.” And they weep, their tears carving hot tracks through their wispy fur, dripping down their chin. “No one gave me a choice.”

_But you could give them a choice._

You pause and study Candles’ grief-wracked face. They are so familiar to you now that you could hunt across the star fields for centuries and still recognise them when you came home, the memory of them as fresh as a wound. You hesitate. And then you ask them, “What should I call you?”

A flicker of hesitation. Then, “He.”

“ _He_.” You test the heft of the word on your tongue, smack your lips. And then you nod. “He.”

“I liked the sound of it,” Candles admits, ears twitching. “Do you think it’s silly?”

You touch his hand.

“It’s perfect,” you tell him. And Candles’ face lights up with shy, numinous delight, like the light of a new law.

**Author's Note:**

> veils/candles? veils/candles anyone?
> 
> [tumblr link](https://queenofinks.tumblr.com/post/615129220367220736/a-conversation-queenofinks-fallen-london)


End file.
